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A procession along
Ludwigstraße/
Odeons platz during
the Day of German
Art, 18 July 1937
ber in the Bürgerbräukeller, at the Feldherrnhalle
12 and as of 1935 also at
the Temples of Honour on Königs platz.
The temples served as the central sites
of the pseudo-religious party cult, for it
was here in 1935 that the coffins of the
“martyrs” of November 1923 were re -
buried. The annual re-enactment of the
“March on the Feldherrnhalle” culminated
in a ritual-laden rally where the
“racial community” was reminded of
National Socialism’s origins in the “Capi-
tal of the Movement” and exhorted
to keep the faith of the “martyrs” of
9 November 1923.
The Nazis demonstrated an acute
sense of how to manipulate the masses.
Rousing parades, night-time spectacles
of light and pathos-laden appeals
were all designed to convey to the public
the regime’s special right to rule.
Here the propagandists drew on the
repository of ancient mythology, the
Nordic sagas, the Middle Ages and the
operatic world of Richard Wagner. All
these elements could be seen at the
annual Day of German Art. The mass
parades of 1937 – 1939, which went
through the city centre, passing a tribune
of honour at Odeonsplatz 13 , were
staged under the motto “2000 Years of
German Culture” and used a mixture of
Nazi ideology and nebulous ideas about
Teutonic virtues and chivalry to portray
in a theatrical way the claim of German
cultural and intellectual superiority.
Poster for the
Exhibition of Great
German Art, 1937
34 35